Story Highlights

You were madly in love with this attractive new technology once, and who could blame you? TiVo did more, arguably, to change the balance of power in the TV viewer's favor than almost anything else that was out there. At first you were seduced by the ability to pause live TV and race past the commercials. But what made TiVo truly special was that you no longer had to be held captive by some TV network programmer. You could watch favorites on your own timetable — get a "Season Pass" to a show and it automatically landed on your TiVo. It didn't matter when it aired or what channel it was on.

Alas, the romance faded. Oh, you still appreciated all that your TiVo could do. But TiVo no longer stood out in a crowd. Your cable or satellite TV provider or FiOS supplied its own DVR and even if it wasn't as slick, easy to use or fully featured as TiVo, it was generally good enough. It often cost less, too.

You also started playing the field by catching up on shows on your smartphone or tablet, or via the various viewing options that presented themselves on televisions and rival set-top boxes that were connected to the Internet.

So you broke up with TiVo, and now the company is doing what it can to woo you back and attract new customers. Last year TiVo signed Tim Tebow as a company spokesman and can only hope that the relationship works out better for them than it did for the New York Jets. TiVo has also struck deals with cable companies around the world, which has helped reverse a loss of subscribers.

For the consumer, of course, it boils down to TiVo's products, of which I remain a fan. TiVo sells three main DVRs these days, starting with the entry level, $149.99 TiVo Premiere model, which has two TV tuners for recording a couple of shows at the same time. The step-up models, the Premiere 4 ($249.99) and the Premiere XL4 ($399.99) each have four-tuner DVRs that let you record up to four channels simultaneously, with the latter letting you store up to 300 high-definition hours.

Service fees are lumped on top of what you'll play for the DVR itself — typically $14.99 a month with a one-year commitment, after which you go month to month. Or you could pay $499.99 covering fees for the lifetime of the box. So TiVo has never been cheap.

On St. Patrick's Day, the company started selling a small plastic set-top box called TiVo Mini that promises to extend the TiVo experience to a second TV in the house, without making you buy a second DVR. Mini can't do everything its big brother TiVo can do, but it comes pretty close. You can use it to watch live or prerecorded television on that second TV, get Season Passes, schedule recordings, browse TiVo "collections" (e.g., Academy Award Winning Films, KidZone, etc.) and more. You can start a show in one room and finish it on a TiVo Mini in another. The TV connected to the Mini displays the same familiar TiVo interface and uses a regular TiVo remote control.

Mini costs $99.99 and requires one of the more expensive four-tuner models, since it makes use of one of those spare tuners. (When it does, neither the Premiere 4 or XL4 can use the now occupied tuner to watch or record shows.)

Moreover, there's an additional hit that some viewers will have a tough time swallowing — TiVo Mini piles on its own separate service fee, either $5.99 a month or $149.99 for the life of the Mini.

I had to endure a few hassles during the Mini setup.

Because my own TiVo was an older incompatible Premiere model, I substituted Premiere 4 for testing purposes. It was in an upstairs bedroom with the Mini connected to a basement TV.

I pulled out the "CableCard" issued by my TV provider, FiOS, from the old TiVo and inserted it into the new Premiere 4. I then had to call FiOS to reactivate the card for a new device and connect to TiVo to make sure two weeks of programming data were up to date. This took awhile.

You'll have to activate the Mini with TiVo either online or by calling customer support, then wait 15 minutes before proceeding.

Perhaps the biggest drawback of the Mini, aside from the extra fee, is that it doesn't work over wireless connections. The Wi-Fi that you may have been using for your main DVR won't do you any good with the Mini. That leaves you with two options. You can connect the main DVR to an ethernet cable, if you happen to have one nearby.

The other recommended alternative is to take advantage of something called MoCA, not a coffee-flavored drink but rather networking technology. I was lucky. MoCA, which stands for Multimedia over Coax Alliance, is built into my FiOS router. So all I had to do was connect a coax cable to the Mini. Otherwise you'll likely have to purchase a MoCA adapter. TiVo is advertising an Actiontec network adapter for about $50.

Once up and running, the Mini worked, well like a TiVo, though I did once briefly lose the connection with the main DVR. In addition to watching live and recorded shows, the Mini lets you access Hulu Plus, YouTube, AOL On, Spotify, Pandora, Rhapsody, Live365, Podcaster, Picasa or Photobucket. You can also play such games as Blackjack or QuizzMaster.

For now, though, you cannot access Amazon Instant Video or Netflix, as on the main TiVo, something TiVo expects to come to the Mini.

TiVo sells another small box I've tried called TiVo Stream that lets Stream content to an iPad or other mobile device. You can also download shows to take with you — which can take awhile and eat up a fair amount of space — but only those programs that aren't saddled with copy protections. TiVo Stream connects to your router and costs $129.99 and, like the Mini, requires an ethernet cable or MoCA.

Despite their limitations, the Mini and TiVo Stream work well enough to have you consider rekindling your relationship with TiVo. Or sparking a brand new romance.

E-mail: ebaig@usatoday.com; Follow @edbaig on Twitter

THE BOTTOM LINE

TiVo Mini

www.tivo.com

$99.99, plus fees that are typically $5.99 a month

Pro. Lets you turn a second TV into a TiVo at lower cost than buying second DVR.

Con. Requires four-tuner TiVo, and additional fees. Doesn't work over Wi-Fi, which can require a network adapter or cause setup hassles. Doesn't deliver Amazon or Netflix or provide all TiVo features.